The Talisman toc-2

by Walter Scott

  The physician had then recourse to his astrolabe, the oracle of Eastern science, and watching with grave precision until the precise time of the evening prayer had arrived, he sunk on his knees, with his face turned to Mecca, and recited the petitions which close the Moslemah's day of toil. The bishop and the English baron looked on each other, meanwhile, with symptoms of contempt and indignation, but neither judged it fit to interrupt El Hakim in his devotions, unholy as they considered them to be.

  The Arab arose from the earth, on which he had prostrated himself, and walking into the hut where the patient lay extended, he drew a sponge from a small silver box, dipped perhaps in some aromatic distillation, for when he put it to the sleeper's nose, he sneezed, awoke, and looked wildly around. He was a ghastly spectacle as he sat up almost naked on his couch, the bones and cartilages as visible through the surface of his skin as if they had never been clothed with flesh. His face was long, and furrowed with wrinkles; but his eye, though it wandered at first, became gradually more settled. He seemed to be aware of the presence of his dignified visitors, for he attempted feebly to pull the covering from his head in token of reverence, as he inquired, in a subdued and submissive voice, for his master.

  "Do you know us, vassal?" said the Lord of Gilsland.

  "Not perfectly, my lord," replied the squire faintly. "My sleep has been long and full of dreams. Yet I know that you are a great English lord, as seemeth by the red cross, and this a holy prelate, whose blessing I crave on me a poor sinner."

  "Thou hast it—BENEDICTIO DOMINI SIT VOBISCUM," said the prelate, making the sign of the cross, but without approaching nearer to the patient's bed.

  "Your eyes witness," said the Arabian, "the fever hath been subdued. He speaks with calmness and recollection—his pulse beats composedly as yours—try its pulsations yourself."

  The prelate declined the experiment; but Thomas of Gilsland, more determined on making the trial, did so, and satisfied himself that the fever was indeed gone.

  "This is most wonderful," said the knight, looking to the bishop; "the man is assuredly cured. I must conduct this mediciner presently to King Richard's tent. What thinks your reverence?"

  "Stay, let me finish one cure ere I commence another," said the Arab; "I will pass with you when I have given my patient the second cup of this most holy elixir."

  So saying he pulled out a silver cup, and filling it with water from a gourd which stood by the bedside, he next drew forth a small silken bag made of network, twisted with silver, the contents of which the bystanders could not discover, and immersing it in the cup, continued to watch it in silence during the space of five minutes. It seemed to the spectators as if some effervescence took place during the operation; but if so, it instantly subsided.

  "Drink," said the physician to the sick man—"sleep, and awaken free from malady."

  "And with this simple-seeming draught thou wilt undertake to cure a monarch?" said the Bishop of Tyre.

  "I have cured a beggar, as you may behold," replied the sage. "Are the Kings of Frangistan made of other clay than the meanest of their subjects?"

  "Let us have him presently to the King," said the Baron of Gilsland. "He hath shown that he possesses the secret which may restore his health. If he fails to exercise it, I will put himself past the power of medicine."

  As they were about to leave the hut, the sick man, raising his voice as much as his weakness permitted, exclaimed, "Reverend father, noble knight, and you, kind leech, if you would have me sleep and recover, tell me in charity what is become of my dear master?"

  "He is upon a distant expedition, friend," replied the prelate—"on an honourable embassy, which may detain him for some days."

  "Nay," said the Baron of Gilsland, "why deceive the poor fellow?—Friend, thy master has returned to the camp, and you will presently see him."

  The invalid held up, as if in thankfulness, his wasted hands to Heaven, and resisting no longer the soporiferous operation of the elixir, sunk down in a gentle sleep.

  "You are a better physician than I, Sir Thomas," said the prelate—"a soothing falsehood is fitter for a sick-room than an unpleasing truth."

  "How mean you, my reverend lord?" said De Vaux hastily. "Think you I would tell a falsehood to save the lives of a dozen such as he?"

  "You said," replied the bishop, with manifest symptoms of alarm—"you said the esquire's master was returned—he, I mean, of the Couchant Leopard."

  "And he IS returned," said De Vaux. "I spoke with him but a few hours since. This learned leech came in his company."

  "Holy Virgin! why told you not of his return to me?" said the bishop, in evident perturbation.

  "Did I not say that this same Knight of the Leopard had returned in company with the physician? I thought I had," replied De Vaux carelessly. "But what signified his return to the skill of the physician, or the cure of his Majesty?"

  "Much, Sir Thomas—it signified much," said the bishop, clenching his hands, pressing his foot against the earth, and giving signs of impatience, as if in an involuntary manner. "But where can he be gone now, this same knight? God be with us—here may be some fatal errors!"

  "Yonder serf in the outer space," said De Vaux, not without wonder at the bishop's emotion, "can probably tell us whither his master has gone."

  The lad was summoned, and in a language nearly incomprehensible to them, gave them at length to understand that an officer had summoned his master to the royal tent some time before their arrival at that of his master. The anxiety of the bishop appeared to rise to the highest, and became evident to De Vaux, though, neither an acute observer nor of a suspicious temper. But with his anxiety seemed to increase his wish to keep it subdued and unobserved. He took a hasty leave of De Vaux, who looked after him with astonishment, and after shrugging his shoulders in silent wonder, proceeded to conduct the Arabian physician to the tent of King Richard.

  CHAPTER IX.

  This is the prince of leeches; fever, plague,

  Cold rheum, and hot podagra, do but look on him,

  And quit their grasp upon the tortured sinews.

  ANONYMOUS.

  The Baron of Gilsland walked with slow step and an anxious countenance towards the royal pavilion. He had much diffidence of his own capacity, except in a field of battle, and conscious of no very acute intellect, was usually contented to wonder at circumstances which a man of livelier imagination would have endeavoured to investigate and understand, or at least would have made the subject of speculation. But it seemed very extraordinary, even to him, that the attention of the bishop should have been at once abstracted from all reflection on the marvellous cure which they had witnessed, and upon the probability it afforded of Richard being restored to health, by what seemed a very trivial piece of information announcing the motions of a beggardly Scottish knight, than whom Thomas of Gilsland knew nothing within the circle of gentle blood more unimportant or contemptible; and despite his usual habit of passively beholding passing events, the baron's spirit toiled with unwonted attempts to form conjectures on the cause.

  At length the idea occurred at once to him that the whole might be a conspiracy against King Richard, formed within the camp of the allies, and to which the bishop, who was by some represented as a politic and unscrupulous person, was not unlikely to have been accessory. It was true that, in his own opinion, there existed no character so perfect as that of his master; for Richard being the flower of chivalry, and the chief of Christian leaders, and obeying in all points the commands of Holy Church, De Vaux's ideas of perfection went no further. Still, he knew that, however unworthily, it had been always his master's fate to draw as much reproach and dislike as honour and attachment from the display of his great qualities; and that in the very camp, and amongst those princes bound by oath to the Crusade, were many who would have sacrificed all hope of victory over the Saracens to the pleasure of ruining, or at least of humbling, Richard of England.

  "Wherefore," said the baron to himself, "it is in no sense i
mpossible that this El Hakim, with this his cure, or seeming cure, wrought on the body of the Scottish squire, may mean nothing but a trick, to which he of the Leopard may be accessory, and wherein the Bishop of Tyre, prelate as he is, may have some share."

  This hypothesis, indeed, could not be so easily reconciled with the alarm manifested by the bishop on learning that, contrary to his expectation, the Scottish knight had suddenly returned to the Crusaders' camp. But De Vaux was influenced only by his general prejudices, which dictated to him the assured belief that a wily Italian priest, a false-hearted Scot, and an infidel physician, formed a set of ingredients from which all evil, and no good, was likely to be extracted. He resolved, however, to lay his scruples bluntly before the King, of whose judgment he had nearly as high an opinion as of his valour.

  Meantime, events had taken place very contrary to the suppositions which Thomas de Vaux had entertained. Scarce had he left the royal pavilion, when, betwixt the impatience of the fever, and that which was natural to his disposition, Richard began to murmur at his delay, and express an earnest desire for his return. He had seen enough to try to reason himself out of this irritation, which greatly increased his bodily malady. He wearied his attendants by demanding from them amusements, and the breviary of the priest, the romance of the clerk, even the harp of his favourite minstrel, were had recourse to in vain. At length, some two hours before sundown, and long, therefore, ere he could expect a satisfactory account of the process of the cure which the Moor or Arabian had undertaken, he sent, as we have already heard, a messenger commanding the attendance of the Knight of the Leopard, determined to soothe his impatience by obtaining from Sir Kenneth a more particular account of the cause of his absence from the camp, and the circumstances of his meeting with this celebrated physician.

  The Scottish knight, thus summoned, entered the royal presence as one who was no stranger to such scenes. He was scarcely known to the King of England, even by sight, although, tenacious of his rank, as devout in the adoration of the lady of his secret heart, he had never been absent on those occasions when the munificence and hospitality of England opened the Court of its monarch to all who held a certain rank in chivalry. The King gazed fixedly on Sir Kenneth approaching his bedside, while the knight bent his knee for a moment, then arose, and stood before him in a posture of deference, but not of subservience or humility, as became an officer in the presence of his sovereign.

  "Thy name," said the King, "is Kenneth of the Leopard—from whom hadst thou degree of knighthood?"

  "I took it from the sword of William the Lion, King of Scotland," replied the Scot.

  "A weapon," said the King, "well worthy to confer honour; nor has it been laid on an undeserving shoulder. We have seen thee bear thyself knightly and valiantly in press of battle, when most need there was; and thou hadst not been yet to learn that thy deserts were known to us, but that thy presumption in other points has been such that thy services can challenge no better reward than that of pardon for thy transgression. What sayest thou—ha?"

  Kenneth attempted to speak, but was unable to express himself distinctly; the consciousness of his too ambitious love, and the keen, falcon glance with which Coeur de Lion seemed to penetrate his inmost soul, combining to disconcert him.

  "And yet," said the King, "although soldiers should obey command, and vassals be respectful towards their superiors, we might forgive a brave knight greater offence than the keeping a simple hound, though it were contrary to our express public ordinance."

  Richard kept his eye fixed on the Scot's face, beheld and beholding, smiling inwardly at the relief produced by the turn he had given to his general accusation.

  "So please you, my lord," said the Scot, "your majesty must be good to us poor gentlemen of Scotland in this matter. We are far from home, scant of revenues, and cannot support ourselves as your wealthy nobles, who have credit of the Lombards. The Saracens shall feel our blows the harder that we eat a piece of dried venison from time to time with our herbs and barley-cakes."

  "It skills not asking my leave," said Richard, "since Thomas de Vaux, who doth, like all around me, that which is fittest in his own eyes, hath already given thee permission for hunting and hawking."

  "For hunting only, and please you," said the Scot. "But if it please your Majesty to indulge me with the privilege of hawking also, and you list to trust me with a falcon on fist, I trust I could supply your royal mess with some choice waterfowl."

  "I dread me, if thou hadst but the falcon," said the King, "thou wouldst scarce wait for the permission. I wot well it is said abroad that we of the line of Anjou resent offence against our forest-laws as highly as we would do treason against our crown. To brave and worthy men, however, we could pardon either misdemeanour.—But enough of this. I desire to know of you, Sir Knight, wherefore, and by whose authority, you took this recent journey to the wilderness of the Dead Sea and Engaddi?"

  "By order," replied the knight, "of the Council of Princes of the Holy Crusade."

  "And how dared any one to give such an order, when I—not the least, surely, in the league—was unacquainted with it?"

  "It was not my part, please your highness," said the Scot, "to inquire into such particulars. I am a soldier of the Cross—serving, doubtless, for the present, under your highness's banner, and proud of the permission to do so, but still one who hath taken on him the holy symbol for the rights of Christianity and the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre, and bound, therefore, to obey without question the orders of the princes and chiefs by whom the blessed enterprise is directed. That indisposition should seclude, I trust for but a short time, your highness from their councils, in which you hold so potential a voice, I must lament with all Christendom; but, as a soldier, I must obey those on whom the lawful right of command devolves, or set but an evil example in the Christian camp."

  "Thou sayest well," said King Richard; "and the blame rests not with thee, but with those with whom, when it shall please Heaven to raise me from this accursed bed of pain and inactivity, I hope to reckon roundly. What was the purport of thy message?"

  "Methinks, and please your highness," replied Sir Kenneth, "that were best asked of those who sent me, and who can render the reasons of mine errand; whereas I can only tell its outward form and purport."

  "Palter not with me, Sir Scot—it were ill for thy safety," said the irritable monarch.

  "My safety, my lord," replied the knight firmly, "I cast behind me as a regardless thing when I vowed myself to this enterprise, looking rather to my immortal welfare than to that which concerns my earthly body."

  "By the mass," said King Richard, "thou art a brave fellow! Hark thee, Sir Knight, I love the Scottish people; they are hardy, though dogged and stubborn, and, I think, true men in the main, though the necessity of state has sometimes constrained them to be dissemblers. I deserve some love at their hand, for I have voluntarily done what they could not by arms have extorted from me any more than from my predecessors, I have re-established the fortresses of Roxburgh and Berwick, which lay in pledge to England; I have restored your ancient boundaries; and, finally, I have renounced a claim to homage upon the crown of England, which I thought unjustly forced on you. I have endeavoured to make honourable and independent friends, where former kings of England attempted only to compel unwilling and rebellious vassals."

  "All this you have done, my Lord King," said Sir Kenneth, bowing—"all this you have done, by your royal treaty with our sovereign at Canterbury. Therefore have you me, and many better Scottish men, making war against the infidels, under your banners, who would else have been ravaging your frontiers in England. If their numbers are now few, it is because their lives have been freely waged and wasted."

  "I grant it true," said the King; "and for the good offices I have done your land I require you to remember that, as a principal member of the Christian league, I have a right to know the negotiations of my confederates. Do me, therefore, the justice to tell me what I have a title to be acquainted with, and w
hich I am certain to know more truly from you than from others."

  "My lord," said the Scot, "thus conjured, I will speak the truth; for I well believe that your purposes towards the principal object of our expedition are single-hearted and honest, and it is more than I dare warrant for others of the Holy League. Be pleased, therefore, to know my charge was to propose, through the medium of the hermit of Engaddi—a holy man, respected and protected by Saladin himself—"

  "A continuation of the truce, I doubt not," said Richard, hastily interrupting him.

  "No, by Saint Andrew, my liege," said the Scottish knight; "but the establishment of a lasting peace, and the withdrawing our armies from Palestine."

  "Saint George!" said Richard, in astonishment. "Ill as I have justly thought of them, I could not have dreamed they would have humbled themselves to such dishonour. Speak, Sir Kenneth, with what will did you carry such a message?"

  "With right good will, my lord," said Kenneth; "because, when we had lost our noble leader, under whose guidance alone I hoped for victory, I saw none who could succeed him likely to lead us to conquest, and I accounted it well in such circumstances to avoid defeat."

  "And on what conditions was this hopeful peace to be contracted?" said King Richard, painfully suppressing the passion with which his heart was almost bursting.

  "These were not entrusted to me, my lord," answered the Knight of the Couchant Leopard. "I delivered them sealed to the hermit."

  "And for what hold you this reverend hermit—for fool, madman, traitor, or saint?" said Richard.

  "His folly, sire," replied the shrewd Scottish man, "I hold to be assumed to win favour and reverence from the Paynimrie, who regard madmen as the inspired of Heaven—at least it seemed to me as exhibited only occasionally, and not as mixing, like natural folly, with the general tenor of his mind."